Category: Movies Explained

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Movies Explained

Inception Explained

Christopher Nolan’s Inception is a movie that leaves viewers’ heads spinning. The story is fully presented, but the film moves so quickly that the meanings of various events and conversations are easily missed. So this essay will lend a helping hand by providing an extended explanation. And don’t worry: I’ll then give a careful interpretation of that wobbly totem seen in the ending shot.

The premise of Inception is that a new technology, initially invented by the military for training, exists that allows individuals to enter others’ dreams. This enables hired criminal “extractors” like Dom Cobb (Leo DiCaprio) and his partner Arthur (Joseph Gordon-Levitt) to try to access the valuable secrets of important individuals.

In the opening sequence, Cobb and Arthur attempt such an extraction. Their target is wealthy industrialist Mr. Saito (Ken Watanabe), and their plan involves a complex setup: a dream within a dream, meant to lure Saito into revealing his business secrets once he’s tricked into believing he has woken up. The plan fails, however, because Saito identifies a mistake in the dream design of the first dream level: the floor rug is composed of the wrong material.

Here are the rules of dream technology that we learn during this opening sequence and in later scenes. They aren’t dwelled upon, so it’s important to go over them:

  • Each level of dream must be dreamt by one particular person, and the others “follow” that individual into his dream.
  • Whoever is dreaming the dream that the group is currently in cannot follow the others into the next level; he must remain in his own dream level.
  • Each dream must be “designed” beforehand in a way that feels consistent with the rules of reality. Otherwise, the subconscious projections of those who have followed the dreamer into the dream will hunt down the dreamer as a foreign invader.
  • If anyone dies in a dream, he or she will wake up in the previous level (or in reality, if there are no previous levels).
  • If anyone feels pain while sleeping, this pain will feel the same as any other pain, since pain is generated in the mind.
  • A sleeping team member can be woken up by giving them a physical jolt—a “kick”. The team member administering the kick can alert the sleeper that a kick is imminent by playing music in his partner’s headphones, which that partner will hear while still dreaming.
  • Time is perceived differently in different dream levels: each minute is perceived in the next dream level as about 20 minutes. This effect compounds for every level, such that one minute in reality translates to 400 minutes (~7 hours) in the second dream level and 8,000 minutes (~133 hours) in the third.

It’s revealed that Saito was previously aware that an attempt might be made on his secrets. He had welcomed this attempted mission, since it would serve as an “audition” of Cobb and Arthur for a future project that he would bankroll: the planting of an idea in the mind of competing tycoon Ross Fischer (Cillian Murphy) that would lead Fischer to break up his dying father’s empire. Saito is suitably impressed by Dom and Arthur, so he recruits them for the job—but admonishes them to choose a better team, as their previous dream designer (or “architect”) blew the mission by using insufficient detail on the apartment rug.

In return for the future success of this “inception” mission, Saito offers not only a large sum of money, but also the chance for Cobb to “return home.” As we later learn, Cobb has been a fugitive for years ever since an extremely unfortunate sequence of events: his wife Mal (Marion Cotillard) became wrongly convinced that she was living in a dream world, leading her to commit suicide to “wake up.” In addition, she framed Cobb for murder so that he’d be motivated to kill himself and join her in the supposed real world.

We also later learn that, tragically, Mal’s mistaken views were the result of Cobb successfully incepting in her mind the idea that her world wasn’t real. At the time of the inception, this was true: they had been existing in a “Limbo” of unconstructed dream space. But the idea unexpectedly affected her even after waking up.

We see in the opening sequence and its aftermath that not only has Mal’s suicide ripped apart Cobb’s family and legal standing, but it has also severely impaired his ability to complete dream extraction. This is because his ongoing guilt results in Mal herself appearing as a subconscious dream projection and sabotaging Cobb’s missions. Cobb can therefore no longer be the architect of dream levels, as his subconscious (Mal) will then know the layouts and thwart the missions.

These revelations are imparted to new architect Ariadne (Ellen Page), and in one remarkable scene involving a very creepy elevator, Ariadne learns that Cobb is regularly reliving painful memories by dreaming, so that he can feel as though his wife is still alive. We’ll come back later to this important point.

——————————

Back to the plan. Cobb recruits Eames (Tom Hardy), an expert “forger;” and Yusuf (Dileep Rao), a chemist who creates sedation that enables them three levels of dreaming.

The three levels that Ariadne designs for the mission are as follows:

  1. A city level, dreamt by Yusuf.
  2. A hotel level, dreamt by Arthur.
  3. A hospital on a wintry mountain, dreamt by Eames.

The team decides that the most effective implanted idea that will lead Fischer to break up his father’s empire is that his father always wanted him to be his own man, not simply an imitation of his dad. They decide on this strategy based on Eames’ desire to whittle the situation down to a simple essence, not a complicated business decision, and on Cobb’s desire that the idea be based on positive rather than negative emotion.

The plan to incept this idea is that Eames will use his “forgery” talents to impersonate Peter Browning, Fischer’s godfather and his dad’s right hand man. In this guise, he’ll be able to suggest new truths about Fischer’s dad’s plans for his son, which the team will then emphasize in later levels. If all goes well, Fischer’s subconscious will begin to increasingly reflect these new truths, so that eventually Fischer will “convince himself” of the idea about his dad (this way, he won’t be able to trace the idea to its outside source, in which case the inception would fail).

But things start off terribly. In the first level the team is immediately attacked by Fischer’s militarized subconscious, a result of prior dream defense training that didn’t show up in Arthur’s background research. Cobb is livid at this unexpected development, since he alone has conferred with Yusuf and understands that because of the unusually heavy sedation required to achieve three dream levels, dying in these dreams will not result in waking up, but rather descending into Limbo, which, as mentioned before, Cobb inhabited with Mal when she was alive.

Worse still, Saito has been shot in the melee and appears to be quickly dying. If and when he descends into Limbo, there’s no telling how long he’ll perceive himself to be there, and whether his mind will be able to hold up for a potentially enormous period of existence.

Once this grim reality sets in, Cobb explains to the team that the only way for all of them to avoid being killed by Fischer’s subconscious in level 1 and descending into Limbo is to complete the mission as fast as possible—much faster than they had planned for. That’s because if the inception takes hold, Fischer’s subconscious will cease its attacks.

Thus, Eames must conduct a rushed impersonation of Browning, during which he witnesses Fischer’s resentment of his father’s perceived coldness, and his feeling that his father was “disappointed” in him. Eames as Browning tells Fischer of a legal will that would break up the Fischer empire, which his father supposedly meant as his “most precious gift” to his son. Fischer doesn’t understand why in the world his father would do this, but he appears to believe Eames’ lie. Next, Cobb and Arthur force Fischer into naming a random 6-digit code to open a safe, which will be important later.

Pressed for time, they then climb into a van and enter the second dream level. Yusuf stays back to drive (remember, the first level is his dream), evading Fischer’s armed subconscious. It’s clear, though, that he won’t be able to hold out for long. Luckily, the multiplied time in successive dream worlds affords the team some flexibility.

In the second level, the team is almost completely improvising, their meticulous plan in shambles. Cobb insists on a ploy he calls “Mr. Charles,” in which he poses as a dream security officer and alerts Fischer that he’s dreaming. This is risky because Fischer’s subconscious projections will then hunt down the dreamer (in this level’s case, Arthur)—but Cobb is able to convince Fischer that he is a friend, not a foe, keeping Fischer’s subconscious at bay.

Carrying on the mission, Cobb and Arthur ingeniously convince Fischer that Browning staged the kidnapping of Fischer and himself in level 1 (which Fischer at this point believes is the real world) in a traitorous attempt to get access to, and destroy, the will that would break up his business empire. Just as the team had hoped, Fischer’s subconscious projection of Browning then admits to the crime—evidence that Fischer is buying it.

The projection of Browning frames this supposed will as Fischer’s dad’s “last insult”: a “challenge” for his son to build something for himself. Fischer still claims he wouldn’t enact such a self-defeating strategy (“Why would I?”), but the mere fact that his own subconscious is suggesting this possibility is encouraging to the team. Plus, Fischer is visibly emotional about the prospect of his father having previously unknown plans for him.

The team then tells Fischer (lying of course) that they need to enter Browning’s dream world to find out what he knows about Fischer’s dad’s plans, and they all hurriedly enter level three, the skiing/hospital level, dreamt by Eames. Arthur stays behind, as level 2 is his dream.

The problem that arises now is that Yusuf, driving the van in level 1, has run out of time faster than they’d wanted. He plays the cue music, which Arthur hears on the second level and the rest of the team hears on the third, signaling that he’s about to provide the kick by driving through the guardrail. But they’re not ready.

Arthur, who’s been busy single-handedly battling armed guards in whirling hallways, can’t provide a kick in time to bring the rest of them back to level 2 (to thereby receive Yusuf’s kick from level 1); and anyway, the team in level 3 needs much more time to get Fischer to his dad in the hospital and complete the inception. They therefore miss the kick as Yusuf drives through the rail. They know, however, that there will very shortly be a second kick: the van hitting the water.

At this point, two important things happen. The first is that because the van in level 1 is now airborne, level 2 loses gravity, making it extremely difficult for Arthur to provide a kick to bring the team back. The second is that Cobb orders Ariadne to lead the team on level 3 to a direct pathway through the labyrinth to save time. Such a measure, of course, is what Cobb was trying to avoid by having Ariadne design the levels. After all, with his own dangerous subconscious knowing the solution to the maze, the mission is in jeopardy.

But the too-early kick on level 1 has forced his hand. He knows that if Arthur kicks them back to level 2 before the job is done on level 3, they’ve failed. And if Arthur can’t kick them back to level 2 before the van hits the water, they’re all done for.

In a James Bond-esque sequence, Cobb and Ariadne then split from Eames, Saito (who’s still dying from the gun shot on level 1), and Fischer, with the five of them assaulting the armed hospital. When Eames and Saito successfully escort Fischer to the hospital, however, the worst-case scenario occurs: Mal drops from the ceiling and kills Fischer, sending him into Limbo.

It looks like they’ve failed the mission, but Ariadne has a plan to salvage it. This part gets complicated, so stay with me. Ariadne insists that if she and Cobb follow Fischer’s mind into Limbo, gaining the additional time afforded to a deeper dream level, they’ll be able to find Fischer, enabling this sequence to take place:

  1. When Eames on level 3 hears Arthur’s music begin, signaling that a kick will soon bring them back to level 2, he defibrillates Fischer.
  2. Ariadne and Cobb sense the defibrillation in Limbo and ensure that Fischer rides that as his kick back to level 3.
  3. Fischer achieves catharsis with his father in level 3, completing the inception.
  4. Eames blows up the hospital in level 3, providing a kick for Ariadne and Cobb to return to level 3.
  5. Arthur’s kick occurs in level 2, bringing everyone in level 3 back to level 2.
  6. Yusuf’s van hits the water in level 1, bringing everyone back to level 1.

The one hitch is Saito’s health. It’s been a foregone conclusion that he’s not going to survive the mission, and Cobb knows Saito’s going to be dead before they get Fischer out of Limbo. So when Ariadne rides Eames’ kick (blowing up the hospital) back to level 3, Cobb, after finally confronting Mal, stays in Limbo to find Saito, who, due to the unpredictable nature of time in Limbo, has become an old man living alone, having forgotten that he is not living in the real world. This serves as the introductory scene of the movie.

Let’s go back to Fischer. Here’s a summary of how the inception succeeds:

  1. In level 1, Eames (impersonating Browning) tells Fischer that his father had a hidden last will and testament to break up his empire. After that, the team extracts a random 6-digit number from Fischer.
  2. In level 2, the team convinces Fischer that Browning orchestrated the kidnapping in level 1 so that he could gain access to the supposed will and destroy it. Fischer’s subconscious projection of Browning admits to this crime, and frames the will as an “insult,” a “taunt,” and a “challenge” for Fischer to build a better company than his father could. Importantly, in this level the 6-digit code that Fischer randomly named is fed back to him twice: it’s the phone number written by the girl (Eames in disguise) in the lobby, and the hotel room that they use.
  3. In the third level, Fischer meets his dying father and projects what was told to him by his own subconscious projection of Browning in the previous level: that his father wanted his son to break up his empire. But he imagines it not as a taunt, as the projected Browning characterized it in level 2, but rather as a highly emotional bonding moment that reveals that his father harbored untold fatherly love for him, and that if his dad was indeed “disappointed” with him, it was only because he “tried” too hard to emulate him. Crucially, the 6-digit code that Fischer himself generated in level 1, and then which was emphasized in various moments in level 2, is the code to the bedside safe—so that he feels as though he alone knows the code, creating a false sense of father-son closeness.

As you might have noticed, Fischer’s subconscious plays along very well with the team’s goals. This is probably because Fischer already had a deep longing for belated connection with his father. In level 1, Yusuf finds in Fischer’s wallet a sentimental picture of him as a kid with a pinwheel; later, Fischer projects this pinwheel as in the safe with the will, readily linking the will with a positive father-son moment from long ago.

Thus, in trying to convince Fischer that his dad wanted him to “be his own man,” they’re unknowingly giving him exactly what he’s always wanted: an explanation for his father’s frosty demeanor that allows for the notion that his dad truly loved him. A lucky break for the team. (Cobb: “The bigger the issues, the bigger the catharsis.”)

Once the team is safely out of the sinking van in level 1, Fischer confirms to Eames/Browning that he now believes that his dad wanted him to go his own way and that he’ll run the business empire accordingly. It’s also worth noting, here, that based on the mission timeline (they’re on a 10 hour flight), they still need to wait around in level 1 for a whole week before waking up—no challenge now, since Fischer’s subconscious will no longer be attacking them. Understandably, this isn’t shown to us.

————————————————

So that’s the plot explained. But there’s still that spinning totem to talk about, and this requires a thematic analysis of the history between Cobb and Mal. So stay with me for one more section. This is the interesting part.

Recall Cobb’s confrontation with Mal in Limbo. He emotionally overcomes her pleading with him to stay, but not before she makes a hefty argument: that the entire exposition of the movie seems kind of like a dream:

Mal: No creeping doubts? Not feeling persecuted, Dom? Chased around the globe by anonymous corporations and police forces, the way the projections persecute the dreamer? Admit it: you don’t believe in one reality anymore. So choose. Choose to be here. Choose me.

Of course, Cobb is actually talking to his own subconscious here; this argument is being made by his own mind. This makes sense, since on a number of occasions Cobb has indeed shown that he cannot reliably distinguish between reality and dream—especially when he fails to shoot the projection of Mal before she kills Fischer in level 3, instead wondering aloud at the critical moment whether she might be real. He also frequently rushes to his totem after waking up from dreams, demonstrating a lack of confidence in reality.

Why does he have this problem? It seems to be the result of something I mentioned earlier: that Cobb has taken to intentionally dreaming actual memories of Mal in an effort to keep her “alive.” Ariadne swiftly exposes this when Cobb warns her not to use real places for her dream designs lest she lose her grip on reality: “Is that what happened to you?”

The really interesting thing about this, which I believe is lost on just about every viewer, is that the idea that Cobb planted in Mal’s mind—that this world isn’t real—has now begun to possess him as well.

Consider an overlooked line toward the climax, when Cobb and Ariadne are searching for Mal in Limbo.

Cobb: Listen, there’s something you should know about me. About inception.… An idea is like a virus: resilient, highly contagious. The smallest seed of an idea can grow. It can redefine and destroy you.

Here, as we know, he’s starting to explain to Ariadne that it was his incepting of his wife’s mind that ultimately led her to commit suicide. But less obvious is that Cobb is undeniably stating that he, too, has now been affected and destroyed by that same idea. Why else would he note that ideas are “highly contagious” and compare them to viruses?

And we can see exactly how this contagious “virus” has spread to Cobb: after Mal’s suicide, his subconscious dream projection of her continues to argue the idea that was planted in her mind (because in real life, this is in fact what she would have been arguing) and, perversely, begins to succeed in convincing Cobb of that very idea (!).

After all, it’s implied that Cobb’s grasp on reality is progressively weakening—that “it’s getting worse.” With more time listening to Mal in dreams, he’d likely become completely detached from reality. Accidentally, he’s almost incepted himself! Recall that in an early scene right after the failed extraction on Saito, Cobb is harrowingly brandying about a gun in his apartment. He seems to be considering suicide: going Mal’s route. He must be legitimately weighing the notion that “this world isn’t real”: not only has he been infected by the “virus” that he himself created, but it’s on the verge of killing him, as it did Mal.

Now we come to the final scene, where Cobb, after the success of the mission, reunites with his family and spins his totem, which teeters before a cut to black. Is Cobb dreaming this happy ending?

Well, all the evidence suggests that he isn’t. For one, only in this scene does he see the faces of his two children, in my opinion a clear indication that the dreaming is over. Also, Cobb only dons his wedding ring in dreams, and in this scene he’s not wearing it.

Maybe most importantly, though: there really just isn’t any good reason to think that Cobb is dreaming at this point. The mission timeline checks out, Saito clears Cobb for entry as he promised—nothing is noticeably off. Why would Cobb dream such a moment, anyway? He’s shown that he prefers to dream actual memories in which he wishes he had acted differently, not potential happy scenarios.

Nevertheless, Mal’s words hang over us: No creeping doubts?

The ending shot, then, is a test: Have we been infected? Have we, too, succumbed to the resilient, contagious idea that this world isn’t real? Despite all evidence, have we been persuaded by what started as a strategy to get Mal out of Limbo and grew into a destructive, dangerous virus of an idea?

I know that when I saw this movie in theaters, the audience’s reaction indicated that a large portion was indeed persuaded. Ideas, it seems, are indeed powerful: as Cobb says, the smallest seed of an idea can grow.

And perhaps I’m not so immune either: after rewatching Inception to write this piece, I couldn’t help—and I’m sure many can relate—but look around the room once or twice and wonder:

Is this really real?

 

— Jim Andersen

For more on the work of Christopher Nolan, see my explanation of Tenet.

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Movies Explained

Toy Story 3 Explained

Toy Story 3 (2010), directed by Lee Unkrich, is the greatest American animated movie ever made. I know this pronouncement will inspire scorn, since, although the film is popular, it doesn’t get the same reverence as rightful classics like The Lion King (1994), Beauty and the Beast (1991), and Snow White and the Seven Dwarves (1937). But even against heavyweights such as these, Toy Story 3 is king. I’ll dedicate this essay to arguing this claim with a careful analysis of the movie’s themes and characters.

I.

I’ll start by noting that Toy Story 3 is in some ways a remake of an earlier, lesser-known animated feature: Disney’s The Brave Little Toaster (1987), a film about anthropomorphic gang of household appliances whose owner has seemingly left them behind. The gadgets, who only spring to life when humans leave the vicinity, depart the house in desperate search of their “master” and wrestle with the possibility that they’re simply no longer valuable to him.

The Brave Little Toaster is remarkably dark and in some scenes outright disturbing. The movie climaxes in a junkyard, where broken down cars are being chomped to their deaths in a compressor, all the while singing about their assorted regrets. Their laments are harrowing and severe. For instance, you may notice if you watch the clip (linked above), which I’ll continue to refer to throughout this essay, that the final car, who sings of his loving owners eventually having to abandon him when he became too old for use, doesn’t need to be craned to his death—instead, he voluntarily drives into the compressor. (It’s no wonder so many of the YouTube comments recall childhood nightmares stemming from this film.)

But for all TBLT’s embrace of dark situations, the final punch is pulled. That is to say, unlike the junkyard cars, Toaster and his buddies have an owner, Rob, who, inexplicably, actually does want to keep them—so badly, in fact, that when he finds them in the junkyard, he almost dies trying to pull them off the electromagnet. The whole thing was a misunderstanding: he never meant to leave them behind.

So the movie ends happily with a reunion. Still, the overall effect is unsettling: what would have happened to Toaster and his friends if their owner weren’t a fanatical junk enthusiast? What happens to every other toaster, lamp, radio, vacuum cleaner, and blanket in this universe? The Brave Little Toaster attempts to lift our spirits, but it only makes us thankful that Rob is a borderline insane individual.

We’ll give it a pass, though. TBLT confronts a thorny theme that probably doesn’t belong in a children’s movie to begin with: the dark prospect of abandonment. Who could blame it for a less than honest ending? Come to think of it, even for adults, is there any film in existence that takes that most shudder-inducing of real world facts—that our loved ones sometimes move on from us—and gives it authentic positivity? Would such a film even be possible?

 

II.

Eight years after TBLT’s release, one of its lead animators, John Lasseter, directed and co-wrote the first full-length CGI film ever made, Toy Story (1995). And it features a suspiciously familiar premise: household objects are secretly alive, and they pine for love and usefulness. For the second time, Lasseter uses this concept as a springboard for exploring themes of replacement and moving on: the story revolves around protagonist Sheriff Woody’s (Tom Hanks) coming to terms with losing his role as “Andy’s favorite toy.”

But despite the excellence of Toy Story, the viewers are again spared: Woody ultimately befriends newcomer Buzz and realizes that they can both be loved by Andy: the jealousy and competition were, it turns out, unnecessary. Woody’s line from early in the film proves correct: “No one is getting replaced.”

Lasseter returns to write and direct Toy Story 2 (1999), though, and this time he’s bold enough to suggest that, actually, one day, things might not be so rosy. One of the antagonists, Stinky Pete, repeatedly raises the uncomfortable truth that, one day, all toys are thrown away:

Stinky Pete: Idiots! Children destroy toys! You’ll all be ruined! Forgotten! Rotting for eternity in some landfill!

And a new character, Jessie, exemplifies this trajectory in the movie’s most emotional sequence. But in the end of this relatively weak installment, Woody and friends simply decide to return to Andy and triumphantly do so.

It’s plain to see what’s happening. The series is careening closer and closer to The Brave Little Toaster. It’s as if the evil electromagnet were pulling us (or, more accurately, Lasseter) back toward that creepy junkyard, where Toaster and his pals witnessed the truth about what eventually happens to anthropomorphic junk.

And in Toy Story 3 (2010), with Lasseter co-writing, we finally get there. This time, there’s no deus ex machina: Andy is a normal boy on his way to college, not a weird trash lover like Rob, and like every normal college-bound boy, he no longer plays with toys. Our beloved characters, whose existences were defined by Andy’s love in the first two movies, are put away for storage and accidentally thrown out.

 

III.

Why does this premise have such an emotional hold on us? We in the audience aren’t toys or toasters; we don’t need to be played with or used; we don’t have owners—and yet, this is a heartbreaking exposition. Why?

Consider that these characters, unlike any other characters in the history of cinema, are literally mass-produced. They’re made in a factory, painted, distributed. They have many identical replicas in the world. As Buzz painfully learns in the first movie, they’re not unique.

I think that our peculiar attachment to Woody and his pals is for precisely this reason. It allows these movies to tap into a feeling characteristic of contemporary life, a kind of dread, actually: the worry that we aren’t meaningfully unique, that we’re completely replaceable.

It affects all of us. On one hand, we know that we have personalities and experiences that make us unlike any other single person. But on the other hand, don’t our experiences sometimes bitterly suggest that even those who love us can find a person just as good, if not better, when the time is right?

These days, we move around a lot: home to home, employer to employer, relationship to relationship, group of friends to group of friends—and there’s always someone to fill our places. Plus, we live pretty long—long enough, in fact, for many of us to see the day (like the last car in the junkyard) when our caretakers simply leave us. Are we actually so unique and invaluable, then, in today’s world? Or can anyone be replaced on a whim?

 

IV.

Enter Lots-o’-Huggin Bear, the most terrifying animated villain in movie history. I assure you that the evil queen from Snow White cowers before him. Ursula’s tentacles quiver at the mention of his name. Scar whimpers like a kitten, I’ve heard, at a whiff of his strawberry scent. 

Like every Disney or Pixar villain, Lotso is a selfish fiend. Unlike the others, though, he’s not out to gain anything. He’s not trying to take over a kingdom or marry the protagonist. He already runs Sunnyside, and he’s content to continue doing so. His selfishness, rather, is the avoidance of his own emotional pain—at any cost.

This alone makes Lotso infinitely more relatable than the typical larger than life villains trotted out by animation studios. He’s especially relatable, in fact, to the heroes of Toy Story 3. After all, his story isn’t so different from theirs in the prior installments: after being separated from his beloved owner, he arduously treks home to rejoin her. But instead of slipping happily back into place, as they’re able to do, Lotso finds that he has already been replaced by an identical toy.

What if, during Woody’s absence in Toy Story, Andy’s mom had bought a new sheriff? Or a new Buzz in Toy Story 2? It isn’t farfetched at all: as I noted before, the toys are literally mass-produced objects.

So how can they refute Lotso when he preaches the doctrine that all toys are nothing more than interchangeable pieces of plastic? Not only could they have easily met his fate, but they are also at this very moment essentially meeting it anyway: with Andy on his way to college, his toys are obsolete. He has replaced them with a new life, his young adult life. Even Woody, who’s coming along for sentimental reasons, will never be played with again.

Lotso thus has the upper hand, and he exerts it calmly in their haunting confrontation atop a dumpster:

Lotso: What are y’all doing? Runnin’ back to your kid? He don’t want you no more!”

Woody: That’s a lie.

Lotso: Is it? Tell me this Sheriff: if your kid loves you so much, why is he leaving?

There it is, plainly put. This question from Lotso, although it may not be clear at first viewing, is what the trilogy has been working toward all along. It’s the question that The Brave Little Toaster was ultimately too timid to ask but which Lasseter has finally built himself up to pose with seriousness: If a loving bond ends in abandonment, how can it have been real love?

The toys must use all they’ve learned and experienced over the course of the series to respond to this frightening rhetoric. For example, when Lotso drawlingly suggests they come back and “join our family again,” Jessie bursts out, “This isn’t a family! You’re a liar and a bully! … I’d rather rot in this dumpster than join any ‘family’ of yours.” Consider how moving this is from Jessie, who early in Toy Story 2 was desperate to have Woody complete her “family” of Roundup characters so as to avoid being shoved aside as she was by her previous owner. Now, she’s willing to accept oblivion. She’s learned a new definition of family, and she won’t settle for anything less.

Next we get another inspiring moment, this one from an unlikely character. When I first viewed Toy Story 3, I wondered early on why Pixar opted to introduce Barbie and Ken to the mix; after all, they’re a bit overdone. But in the face of Lotso’s taunting, that very ubiquity enables this show-stopping exchange:

Ken: Don’t do this, Lotso!

Lotso: She’s a Barbie doll, Ken! There’s a hundred million just like her!”

Ken: Not to me, there’s not.

Ken has been wholly comic relief until this line, so there’s a temptation to laugh it off, but where in all of Pixar/Disney is there a more genuine romantic moment?

I’m serious. Sure, the studios have fed us memorable love stories for decades, but they’re fairy tales. They’re fated, mandated by destiny. The characters are so exceptional—being various blends of every admirable quality imaginable (and usually royalty, too)—that how could the pairings not work out? Meanwhile, Ken confronts the existence of an infinite number of exactly equivalent options, and, risking death, still chooses Barbie—because….she’s herself. You tell me which is more romantic.

These heroic stands by Ken and Jessie jab at Lotso’s bleak philosophy, but they don’t really faze him. His question still stands: If your kid loves you so much, why is he leaving? He hurls Ken over the dumpster and makes the point again:

Lotso: I didn’t throw you away, your kid did! Ain’t no kid ever loved a toy, really.

For me, this is brutal to watch. He’s hitting them where it hurts. How can the toys, who have sacrificed so much for Andy’s love only to be put away in the attic and left behind, disprove Lotso?

Luckily for the toys—and for us, since, as I’ve indicated, we’re invested in this philosophical clash too—there’s one toy equipped through experience to do rhetorical battle with Lotso. Only Sheriff Woody can save the day.

Woody alone in the series has felt the pain of being replaced. Recall that in the first movie, he’s overcome by jealousy when Buzz becomes Andy’s new favorite toy, and is driven to reprehensible acts. He knows what this feeling can do to a toy, so he steps up and diagnoses the problem:

Lotso: Then she threw us out.

Woody: No. She lost you!

Lotso: She replaced us!

Woody: She replaced you, and if you couldn’t have her, no one could!

Although he’s referring to Lotso’s treatment of Big Baby here, he’s more generally criticizing Lotso’s overall philosophy, essentially arguing: “If you couldn’t be loved, then you decided love was impossible for anyone!” He’s pointing out the disingenuousness of Lotso’s cynicism, speaking, as I’ve said, from experience.

The truly inspiring development, however, is that after Woody recognizes that Lotso was indeed replaced, he insists: “She loved you, Lotso. As much as any kid ever loved a toy.”

Think about this. Woody isn’t saying that Daisy still loves Lotso in any practical sense; he knows she doesn’t. He’s saying that she did love him, and that’s enough. Even though she found another to fill his place, it was love while it lasted, and it was worthwhile. Only someone who was replaced, got past it painfully, and adjusted to a new normal could have made this remarkable statement. Consider too that Woody is by extension admitting that Andy, too, may one day no longer love his toys—perhaps he already doesn’t—but at the same time is declaring that, really, it’s beside the point.

As proof, Woody throws over Daisy’s heart badge. It’s now plain for everyone to see: Woody’s right. Who could’ve made that adorable badge, besides a girl who loved her toy? So what if he was replaced?

But Lotso doesn’t break. Rather than concede defeat, he reveals himself as not merely a commentator on interchangeability, but a purveyor of full-blown nihilism, screaming this horrific line, which, re-watching the scene, gives me chills:

Lotso: We’re all just trash, waitin’ to be thrown away!

What doctrine could be sadder? The event of Lotso’s replacement has led him to this: a declaration of total meaninglessness. It’s no surprise, with this worldview, that at the crucial moment later on, he effectively attempts to murder the toys, departing with an absurd taunt that reinforces his ignorance of anything not beneficial to survival: “Where’s your kid now, Sheriff?” The character of Lotso thus demonstrates the particular route to evil that begins with loss.

 

V.

But as Woody later remarks, “He’s not worth it.” They’ve refuted him and his cynicism, so, unlike in The Brave Little Toaster, the junkyard becomes not bleak and harrowing, but merely the unfortunate end of a long road. Since they’ve experienced love and friendship along that road, they’re prepared to accept it. Out of good fortune they’re rescued by their alien friends (who, it seems, have completed their own arc, now controlling ‘The Claw’ for the good of others rather than accepting it as an agent of fate, perhaps inspired by Woody’s recent saving of one of their own), and so they’re free to start anew with Bonnie.

The ensuing scene is mostly tear-jerking that doesn’t need analysis, but there is one interesting moment. When Andy introduces his toys to Bonnie, he mostly describes their media personas—Buzz as a cool space ranger, Jessie as a spunky cowgirl—but summarizes Woody by saying, “He will never, ever, give up on you.” That’s a strange sendoff for Woody. What about his selflessness and leadership—far more defining traits throughout the series? What is Andy referring to?

He’s talking about Woody’s clash with Lotso. Woody alone was able to argue that Andy’s necessary departure and separation from his toys doesn’t make him unloving; it doesn’t take away all they went through together when Andy was younger. Woody alone never gave up on Andy’s love, temporary though it unfortunately had to be. Woody, chiefly, has enabled this moment, where Andy can give them a simple confirmation that, indeed, Lotso was wrong, and everything was real:

“Thanks guys.”

 

P.S.

You may believe me guilty of overthinking a heartwarming family film. Maybe I have. But when themes like these are concerned, it’s far better to overthink than to under-think. Remember Lotso’s raging line to the toys atop the dumpster: “This is what happens when you dummies try to think!”

This is a revealing insult, because Lotso’s original error is that he doesn’t think. When he sees Daisy with the replacement Lotso, he immediately lets his emotions get the better of him and never looks back. He never stops to consider that in order for Daisy’s parents to buy her an identical replacement, she must have been inconsolable when she realized he was gone.

He doesn’t think about the tantrums that must have occurred. He doesn’t think about the tears, the screaming, the devastation. Had he done so, his goodness could have been salvaged.

It’s a very relatable mistake. It’s hard to think clearly when things seem so terrible. But watching movies like Toy Story 3 helps us sort out these issues so that, perhaps, they won’t ruin us in real life. Woody dissuades us from believing our gut reactions that tell us, inaccurately, that we were fooled in thinking we were loved—that “we’re all just trash, waitin’ to be thrown away!”

And that’s why Toy Story 3 is an amazing movie.  But, I know, I know: that’s great, but you still like The Lion King more.

 

— Jim Andersen

For more analyses of popular movies, check out my explanation of Donnie Darko.

 

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Movies Explained

Eyes Wide Shut Explained: Part 2

This is Part 2 of my analysis of Stanley Kubrick’s Eyes Wide Shut. For Part 1, go here.

I’m aware that my analysis in Part 1 only explained the movie’s symbolism and didn’t fill any of its frustrating plot holes. This is because only through an understanding of the symbolism can we piece together the disjointed plot.

First we’ll focus on the mystery of Mandy the prostitute, a.k.a. Amanda Curran, who has three appearances: first she overdoses in Ziegler’s bathroom; later, she “redeems” Bill at the orgy; finally, she turns up dead in the morgue. Ziegler denies foul play in her death, but he’s extremely unconvincing in doing so. He merely discredits her as a “hooker” and even exclaims at one point, “her door was locked from the inside, police are happy, end of story!” It’s pretty clear to Bill—and us—that Mandy was killed.

But the big, unresolved question is: Why would Mandy’s act of redemption at the orgy lead to her having been killed? What does “redeem” even mean?

The key is that this line of questioning is misguided, because it assumes that the events of the orgy scene are their own unique events. As we’ve established, however, the orgy is Bill’s dreamlike reflection of the party at Victor Ziegler’s house. Thus, what we should be asking is: what does Mandy do at the Ziegler party that would cause her to be murdered, and how is that projected by Bill into the orgy scene?

Once we ask this, we arrive at an almost too-simple answer: Mandy is killed to protect Ziegler’s reputation following the incident in his bathroom.

This is not a farfetched speculation. Although Kubrick films the bathroom scene in a low-key, casual tone, the situation is horrific. Ziegler, a married man of tremendous wealth, has a drugged, naked prostitute lying unconscious in his own bathroom while he throws a house party.

I doubt anyone would argue that Ziegler is above ordering someone’s death, especially someone as low on the socioeconomic ladder as Mandy. Remember that later on he demonstrates ugly contempt for her: “She was a hooker. That’s what she was.”

Plus, by examining Bill’s dreamlike reimagining of Ziegler’s party—the orgy sequence—we can see that Bill feared for Mandy’s safety even before she was killed. The man in the red cloak, who, as we’ve determined, represents Ziegler, tells Bill, ominously, “Nothing can change her fate now.” This represents Bill at the end of the bathroom scene worrying that Ziegler will have Mandy killed to keep her from talking.

Thus, despite Bill’s composed demeanor in Ziegler’s bathroom, we know from the orgy scene that he was (justifiably) concerned and even pessimistic about Mandy’s safety.

It also seems, given the words of the man in the red cloak during the orgy, that after the bathroom scene Bill feared for his own safety, as well. At the end of the bathroom scene, Ziegler gently requests that Bill keep what he has seen “just between us.” But in the orgy sequence, this is translated as a fearsome threat from the red-cloaked man: “If you tell anyone about what you have seen, there will be the most dire consequences for you and your family!”

It’s interesting to note that, during Ziegler and Bill’s final conversation in Ziegler’s billiards room, they’re ostensibly discussing the events at the orgy, but most of their dialogue sounds more like they’re talking about Ziegler’s bathroom. Bill asks regarding the newspaper article, “Is this the woman at the party?”—but how does Ziegler know that Bill is talking about the orgy and not Ziegler’s own party, when it was the same woman at both events? Plus, a “party” isn’t quite what I’d call the ritual-like event at the mansion, yet Ziegler somehow doesn’t get confused.

Consider also Ziegler’s insistence: “When they took her home she was just fine.” He’s talking about the end of the orgy, but his words evoke Bill’s advice to Ziegler at his own party: “Then, I’d have someone take her home.” The conversation is written this way to indicate that, while the characters discuss the orgy as a literal event, we should really be focusing on what transpired at Ziegler’s house, viewing the orgy as its dreamlike double.

Mandy’s “redemption” at the orgy, therefore, is a representation of how Mandy justified and validated Bill’s presence at the Ziegler party by overdosing, requiring his assistance. Early in the Ziegler party Bill feels insecure and out of his league, but Mandy’s troubles allow him to prove his worth, hence the “redemption.” He projects her medical distress as a melodramatic, intentional intervention on her part. (Ziegler: “You saved my ass.” Bill: “Glad I was here.”)

This all fits neatly together, but I acknowledge that there are some things that still don’t. You may be wondering, for example, about the identity of the mysterious man on the balcony of the orgy mansion. He appears twice: firstly in the aforementioned zoom shot standing on the balcony, during which he and Bill appear to recognize one another; and secondly in a separate scene in which he silently escorts a woman to Bill’s side.

If we were to view the orgy as its own independent event, we would conclude that the man must be Ziegler, since Ziegler later claims to have been there and is the only person we know who could’ve recognized Bill. But even if we were to view the orgy this way, the man’s actions don’t fit Ziegler at all. We first see the man in the grey mask, as previously stated, nodding cordially to Bill; we next see him calmly escorting a woman over to Bill, apparently encouraging her to have sex with him. Contrastingly, Ziegler later reveals that he is furious with Bill for attending the event. The two characters are simply not compatible.

And we know by now that we shouldn’t be asking who the man in the grey mask is literally. It wouldn’t make sense anyway: how could a masked Bill recognize and single out another man in a mask, and the man recognize him in return? We should be asking whom the man represents from the Ziegler party. Ziegler is already represented by the man in the red cloak (flanked by two men in blue, symbolizing his wealth). It can’t be him.

There is, however, a character that Bill recognizes at the Ziegler party and exchanges cordial greetings with: the piano player, Nick Nightingale.

Now, Nick is technically already at the orgy, but don’t get hung up on that. It’s absolutely clear that the man on the balcony represents Nick at the Ziegler party. Consider that Bill sees the man in the grey mask elevated on the balcony, just as he sees Nick elevated onstage playing the piano. And the reciprocal nod between Bill and the man at the orgy is reminiscent of Bill’s catching up with Nick, not of any other exchange at the Ziegler party.

But now the plot hole: we also see the man in the mask escort a woman to Bill at the orgy, while Nick does no such thing at the party.

Or, to be more precise, we don’t see him do any such thing.

When Nick and Bill talk during the party, Nick makes a strange remark during their greetings. Bill says, “I see you’ve become a pianist,” and Nick replies, “Yes, well, my friends call me that.” It’s subtle, and Bill lets it pass, but it’s not clear what Nick is getting at. What do his non-friends call him?

Soon after this, an anonymous man appears and demands: “Nick, I need you a minute.” This is similar to how Bill is later summoned to Ziegler’s bathroom. But if Nick is only playing piano at the event, why would his presence be needed elsewhere? It’s never explained. Something’s off.

Fortunately, what Kubrick hides in the party sequence, he reveals in the orgy ritual. Nick is responsible for procuring the prostitutes at Ziegler’s party. This is made clear by the aforementioned scene in which the man in the grey mask leads the woman to Bill’s side. This woman, who flirtatiously suggests going “someplace quiet,” represents the two models that flirt with Bill at Ziegler’s and all but offer him sex. It’s implied in the orgy sequence, then, that it was Nick who encouraged these “models” to approach Bill at Ziegler’s party. Recall that we never see their introduction, even though we see Sandor Szavost introduce himself to Alice elsewhere in the mansion.

In addition to explaining the Nick’s suspicious comments and activity at the party, this explains another key discrepancy. If we’re assuming that the orgy ritual is only a dreamlike reimagining of earlier events, then it doesn’t make sense that Nick was forced back to Seattle only because he told Bill about the orgy. As with Mandy, we have to find the reason for his punishment within the Ziegler party, not the orgy. And this problem is solved immediately by realizing that it was Nick who hired Mandy, who in turn embarrassed Ziegler by overdosing and necessitating outside help.

Last section. I know it’s been a long read, but I saved the best for last. The only thing we haven’t covered is Alice’s representation at the orgy ritual—because, for some reason, she isn’t represented at all. Or…is she?

Taking a quick, related detour: it’s incongruous that the orgy sequence features appearances multiple appearances from Mandy, given that she only appears at the very end of the Ziegler party episode. Her early appearances at the orgy largely consist of cryptic warnings to Bill, such as, “Go while you still can,” no parallel of which is observed at the Ziegler party, since Mandy doesn’t interact with Bill during the party. If the two sequences are analogs, how to explain Mandy’s expanded role at the orgy?

Now recall that Alice’s bedroom confession causes Bill to worry whether his sexual relationship with Alice has been sustained only because of his income. This dynamic is disturbingly similar, Bill knows, to prostitution, which is why, as I detailed in Part 1 of this analysis, Bill’s subsequent encounters involve prostitution in various forms. We can fill in the last symbolic gap, therefore, by realizing that at the orgy, Mandy represents herself during the redemption scene—but Alice prior to that.

Bill has reimagined his wife as a prostitute. The fact that he projects Alice and Mandy as the same woman in the orgy shows that he perceives uncomfortable similarities between their lifestyles.

This claim works on all levels. When Bill arrives at the orgy, the red-cloaked man “pairs” him with Mandy, just as Ziegler greets Alice and Bill and sends them off with approval. Mandy’s remark, “I’m not sure what you think you’re doing,” is reminiscent of Alice’s “Do you know anyone here?” early in the party. Finally, when Bill asks Mandy at the orgy, “Who are you?” she responds mysteriously with, “You don’t want to know.” Of course he doesn’t: she’s his wife. Bill is reflecting on his own unwillingness to “unmask” the truths of his marriage.

Since this has been a long, heady analysis, I’ll leave its adjunct part up to you, as you watch Eyes Wide Shut again. We’ve talked only about Bill’s psychological experiences and how they manifest in an elaborate, dreamlike sequence. We haven’t talked about Alice’s experiences—but we could if we wanted to, because Alice also reports some dream sequences of her own. Using the manner of analysis that I’ve laid out here, try to connect Alice’s experience at the Ziegler party to her own dreams, which, although not visualized onscreen like Bill’s, are plenty weird and emotionally packed in their own right. 

Perhaps the image that best summarizes Eyes Wide Shut is Ziegler’s pool table. Since we’ve established that red is symbolically linked with sex, we can interpret this image as a commentary that Ziegler, the epitome of the invulnerable elite, uses sex as a game, like billiards, with those of lesser status as the symbolic billiard balls, all for the purpose of maintaining and abusing power. Even well-off people like Bill are mere billiard balls to true bigwigs like Ziegler. The masses act in their own sexual interests, oblivious to the control being exerted on them from the elite.

I suppose, then, that, in the end, my analysis is ultimately a conspiracy theory. Hopefully, it’s been an enjoyable and informative one. Happy re-watching!

 

–Jim Andersen

For more Kubrick masterpieces explained, check out my equally thorough piece on 2001: A Space Odyssey.

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Movies Explained

Eyes Wide Shut Explained: Part 1

Eyes Wide Shut is Stanley Kubrick’s last film and one of his most difficult to understand. Viewers will likely finish the film with major questions about key events. Who was the woman at the ritual? Who was the man in the grey mask? What was the meaning of the film’s unusual narrative? What was real, and what was a dream?

This piece will definitively answer all of those questions, plus several more. While most analyses of Eyes Wide Shut that I’ve seen focus on connecting the film to dubious, real-world conspiracy theories, my essay below will use actual evidence in the film to draw well supported thematic conclusions. Let the analysis begin.

The action of Eyes Wide Shut begins when Bill Harford’s (Tom Cruise) wife, Alice (Nicole Kidman), makes a confession that rattles him. She shares that, in the early years of their marriage, she found herself fantasizing uncontrollably about a naval officer. Since this precipitates such discomfort in Bill, many have concluded that the subject of the movie is sexual jealousy. Jealousy, however, doesn’t quite fit Bill’s behavior. A jealous husband, upon hearing Alice’s confession, would likely have increased his oversight of her out of suspicion. Bill, on the other hand, leaves the house for long periods to go on adventures of his own.

So the first question that will help us understand Eyes Wide Shut is: why does Bill’s bedroom conversation with Alice leave him so upset, and what is the nature of his emotional state following that conversation? The answer, which I’ll go on to support with evidence, is that Bill has become afraid that Alice married him for his money and that, by extension, she doesn’t desire him sexually. 

How this insecurity could arise from Alice’s confession is fairly clear. Her brief fantasy involved a striking officer of presumably lower economic status than Bill, a doctor. Therefore, the story, intentionally or not, casts Bill as the safe, steady choice—and the officer as the desirable but unviable suitor. Although she was “willing to give up… my whole fucking future” for the man, she ultimately remained with Bill, suggesting that she merely settled for him due to his affluence.

And we know that the interplay between money and sex is Bill’s primary concern post-confession because it dominates his subsequent encounters. Bill’s conversation with Marion Nathanson, for instance, replays Alice’s story of the naval officer with Bill in the role of the desirable stranger. Soon afterward, Bill nearly has sex with a prostitute, and after that, he witnesses costume store owner Mr. Millich discover his young daughter in a sexual situation, a discovery that Millich later profits on by prostituting her.

These minor episodes, however, are only thematic openers to the famous “orgy” sequence, in which Bill manages to gain admission to an event that features masked men and women having sex in bizarre, ritualistic fashion.

The key to understanding the orgy is that it represents Bill reflecting on a previous event—the party at Victor Ziegler’s house—through a new lens that has only become available to him following Alice’s confession. As we’ve said, because of Alice’s story about the naval officer, Bill worries that she married him out of economic incentive. Because of that worry, he reflects on the earlier Ziegler party as a hub for the unsettling exchange of sex and money—a reflection brought onscreen in the dreamlike orgy sequence.

Consider that both scenes—the Ziegler party and the orgy—take place at extravagant mansions, and the prospect of sexual adventure, even outside of marriage, is prominent in both. At the Ziegler party, both Bill and Alice flirt with strangers. Ziegler himself, also married, gets in trouble after a prostitute overdoses in his bathroom, necessitating Bill’s medical intervention. Nearly every scene at Ziegler’s party highlights sex as a driving social force.

In addition, the two scenes feature a common dynamic between men and women, in which men are of higher status and women display sex appeal. At Ziegler’s, Bill banters with “a couple of models,” and Ziegler later admits that the woman in his bathroom was “a hooker.” Meanwhile, Alice’s suitor is a rich “friend of the Zieglers.”

It’s fairly obvious that the models who converse with Bill were paid by Ziegler to attend the party, given that even Bill and Alice feel out of their league at the event. Optimistically, the models may have been hired as eye candy; perhaps more realistically, they’ve been paid to be available for the male guests: they all but offer Bill sex, a rather unlikely development unless explained by professional obligation.

Is the Ziegler party, then, all that different from the orgy scene when it comes to the subject of sex? Recall that at the orgy, a red-cloaked man commands women to undress and sends them off with wealthy male guests. Metaphorically, this resembles what Ziegler has done by paying vulnerable young women to attend his party. A great YouTube video exists here detailing the interesting visual cues that link Ziegler to the “man in the red cloak” who leads the ritual at the orgy. It’s difficult to disagree, based on the evidence in the video, that Kubrick wants us to recognize that the two characters play essentially the same role at their respective events.

To understand the orgy sequence, think of it as a dream. Of course, it’s not a literal dream, since Bill does attend the event in reality, as evidenced by his costume rental and his later discussion with Ziegler, who references the orgy and claims to have been a guest. But it unfolds in the manner of a dream, with its events and characters based on real events. Eyes Wide Shut is loosely based on Arthur Schnitzler’s book, Traumnovelle, or “Dream Story,” so it makes sense that the story progresses (in parts) as a dream would.

Having definitively established this link between the movie’s two most crucial episodes, we can explore the symbolic cues they provide for the rest of the movie.

First, I’ll focus on Kubrick’s use of color in the two scenes. The Ziegler party is lit by Christmas lights, multicolored and decorative. The orgy scene, on the other hand, features darker lighting and emphasizes red and blue.

ews partyews orgy

We can infer that the multicolored lights represent the “façade” of the Ziegler party, with its formalities and splendor disguising an ugly interior. Indeed, most sets that Bill passes through during the rest of the movie feature Christmas trees with multicolored lights are present. These invoke the Ziegler party, indicating that Bill is still thinking idealistically, clinging to the façade, resisting his growing suspicion that money and sex are intertwined.

However, after Bill’s final talk with Ziegler, he returns home and turns off the Christmas tree lights, indicating that he’s given into that suspicion, acknowledging its truth. He opens the refrigerator and sits down at his table with a beer. This is truly “where the rainbow ends”—the rainbow revealed to mean the rainbow-colored lights that symbolize idealism, as first introduced at Ziegler’s party.

But what of the red and blue scheme featured in the orgy scene? That, too, recurs throughout Bill’s adventure, and those colors signify, respectively, sex and money. Red is always linked with sex, as it was in the orgy scene when the women undressed on the red carpet, and blue is always linked with money.

Consider firstly the costume store. When Bill first visits, the prominent color is red, as Mr. Millich discovers his daughter having sex with two men. But the second time Bill visits, Millich wears all blue. His daughter enters from a red-lit room with the two men seen earlier, and Millich hints that he has prostituted his daughter (“we have come to another arrangement”). Thus, Millich wears blue to represent his monetary gain, while his daughter still wears red, evoking her sexual participation.

ews costume ews costume2

Secondly, consider the scene with Domino the prostitute. She wears purple, the only character in the film to do so. Purple is a mixture of red and blue; fitting, since Domino’s profession embodies the interplay between money and sex. Consider also the image below that features a red and a blue light behind her head.

ews domino ews domino2

There are many other examples of red and blue being used with these connotations. To survey briefly, however, recall the Harfords’ bed (red), the lighting in the Harfords’ expensive apartment (blue), the bars of the orgy mansion doors (blue—only the rich may enter), and the toy store at the end of the movie (red—the couple agrees that the best solution is to “fuck”).

This framework enables a more telling interpretation of some scenes. Let’s return to Bill’s early cab ride, in which he pictures Alice having sex with the naval officer. The images of Alice and the officer are filtered in grey-blue. But why not red, if red is supposed to be associated with sex? It’s because Bill is only now wondering about the economic motivations of sex following Alice’s confession. Although he’s picturing his wife in a sexual act, he isn’t really thinking about sex; he’s thinking about money and its relationship to what he’s picturing.

ews alice

Now that we’ve covered colors, let’s move on to a different motif: masks. In the orgy sequence, everyone wears them. One might wonder why, if the orgy represents the “true” Ziegler party, the participants have been disguised. But this would be a misinterpretation of the relationship between the two scenes.

Think of it like this: since the the Ziegler party operates via facades and deceptions, its guests are represented in the orgy sequence as wearing literal masks. The orgy doesn’t uncover any secrets to Bill; rather, it represents Bill reflecting on the true nature of the event following Alice’s confession.

It’s significant, therefore, that Bill “loses” his mask at the orgy: following the reflection on money and sex that the orgy represents, he’s less able or willing to put on the same social façade as before. Shortly after he loses his mask, he turns off his Christmas tree lights, a similar symbolic event. This, as stated before, is “where the rainbow ends.” Not surprisingly, then, the costume store is called Rainbow Fashion.

But after returning to his apartment after his conversation with Ziegler, the mask is sitting on Bill’s pillow. Why is the mask there, and how did it get there? The answer is that the mask’s presence symbolizes Bill’s last chance to suppress what he has witnessed. The mask represents the social facade of Ziegler’s guests, a facade that Bill also formerly assumed. But Bill has now become aware of that facade after Alice’s confession: he has “lost” his mask. Kubrick signals to us by cutting to the mask that Bill has one more chance to assume the facade again. The mask isn’t literally there; it’s a symbolic visual.

Notice also that Kubrick cuts to the mask on the pillow long before Bill even enters the bedroom. Kubrick is communicating that Bill is considering this return to his blissful ignorance as soon as he enters the apartment. Bill probably thinks it over as he drinks his Budweiser. Ultimately, though, he decides against reclaiming the mask, instead breaking down in tears to Alice (“I’ll tell you everything!”). In a bizarre, Kubrickian way, it’s an uplifting ending, especially since the couple endures the ensuing difficult conversation and decides to remain together.

 

End of Part 1

Continue to Part 2, which explains the mysteries of Mandy the prostitute, the man on the balcony, and whether Alice was at the ritual.

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Movies Explained

The Shining Explained: Part 2

This is the conclusion of my analysis of Kubrick’s The Shining. Part 1 untangled the movie’s reincarnation mysteries, explained the ending photograph, and examined the symbolic meaning of “shining.” This part will explain the mysterious Room 237 scene, the man in the bear costume, and Kubrick’s use of mirrors. 

———————

Contradiction #6: Jack, after encountering the lady in Room 237, calmly tells Wendy afterward that he saw nothing. This lady may be the mother of the murdered twin girls, but for half of the scene she appears as an elderly woman.

This is the most difficult segment of the movie to comprehend, because at first it doesn’t seem like a contradiction. Jack’s words to Wendy seem like an obvious cover up of what he has just experienced in Room 237.

Actually, though, Jack is telling the truth about finding nothing in Room 237, which explains A) his calm demeanor during the subsequent exchange with Wendy and B) his adamant refusal to leave the Overlook, which would be a strange position for someone to take after being chased by a naked, rotting ghost-woman.

My central insight here has already been argued elsewhere, by Rob Ager of collativelearning.com. I intend to clarify and add to that insight, which is this: immediately following the awkward scene in which Danny attempts to retrieve his fire truck from his room and winds up having an eerie conversation with Jack on his lap, Jack molests Danny off-screen. This incident results in Danny’s neck wounds and causes him to become almost catatonic for the remainder of the movie (“Danny’s gone away Mrs. Torrance…”).

Stay with me. This is a heavy claim, and might seem like a stretch. But the evidence is extensive. First, consider the eeriness of the fire truck scene itself.

Jack’s dialogue in this scene is noticeably strange, consisting largely of cryptic phrases like, “I can’t [sleep]. I’ve got too much to do.” Danny clearly notices that something is off and appears quite scared, even requesting reassurance that “you would never hurt mommy and me, would you?” The scene abruptly ends with an out-of-place “bump” in the instrumental score.

Keeping the strangeness of this conversation in mind, consider the infamous scene near the end of the movie in which Wendy comes across a man apparently receiving fellatio from another man in a bear costume (left). This scene is often cited for its apparent randomness, as the man’s identity and behavior are never explained. But recall the scene early in the movie in which Danny talks to the psychologist.

shining2shining1

During that talk, the above image of Danny’s face beside the face of his pillow recurs several times. The pillow, as you can see, depicts a bear. Thus, this image reveals the purpose of man in the bear costume: to tell us that Danny (who is the bear, as the pillow implies) has been sexually forced upon Jack.

This argument opens a gaping hole in the narrative, however. Why, then, did Danny say he was attacked by a “crazy lady” in Room 237? That’s easy. It’s reasonable—expected, even—that Danny would make up a story to avoid implicating his father. The “crazy lady” story sounds very much like what a child would invent to repress a trauma.

Therefore, the scene in which Jack explores Room 237 and finds a nude woman is not a literal event, but Danny’s repressed version of the molestation as he communicates it telepathically to Dick Hallorann. (Remember that during that scene, there are intermittent shots of a trembling Danny and a horrified Hallorann.) The Room 237 scene is the fire truck scene, viewed through Hallorann’s mind as he “shines” it from Danny, who has repressed the literal events. In this repressed version, Danny has been replaced with Jack, and Jack has been replaced by the “crazy lady.”

For evidence, consider the many parallels between the Room 237 scene and the fire truck retrieval scene. Both scenes take place in rooms with the same layout. Both scenes involve an entrant progressing through the layout and seeing someone unexpected—Danny sees Jack awake, Jack sees a woman in the bathtub. Next, this unexpected person makes the same exact motion: Jack’s “come here” gesture to Danny is exactly the same as the bathtub woman’s moving away the curtain. Then, the entrant approaches the unexpected person and the two interact: Danny sits on Jack’s lap, Jack embraces the nude woman.

The fire truck scene cuts here, but we can infer from the Room 237 scene what happens next. In that scene, Jack, after embracing the young woman, sees the woman rotting in the mirror, and he recoils in horror. Symbolically, this is what happens to Danny: he readily approaches his father and then, upon being assaulted, realizes the repulsive side to the initially appealing figure.

There’s a mirror at the foot of Jack’s bed that Kubrick emphasizes with fancy camerawork in multiple scenes. Danny would have seen his own molestation in this mirror, which is why in the Room 237 scene Jack first sees the ugliness of the woman in a mirror. There’s also an editing choice toward the end of the Room 237 scene that shows the old woman rising from the bathtub, which is odd given that our first sight of the woman was as a young woman, not old. This represents Danny’s realization that the figure he approached (his father) was evil all along—that his initially favorable impression of his father was incorrect.

The old woman rising from the bathtub therefore represents Jack waking up from his nap as an ugly, evil person. The shot only comes late in the scene because Danny only realizes too late that he was fooled by his father’s reassuring demeanor.

The brief scene in which an unseen presence rolls a ball toward Danny while he plays with cars is the initiation of Danny’s telepathic communication to Hallorann. Danny is noticeably missing his fire truck in this scene, an indication that his entering Room 237 represents his entering his apartment to retrieve the toy. The scene cuts as Danny enters Room 237 because at this point Danny begins to repress the events; when we next see Room 237, Danny, in his “shining” rendition of events, has replaced himself with his father, and has altered and repressed the sequence as previously described.

So Jack indeed inflicted the bruises on Danny’s neck during the off-screen molestation. Jack denies this to Lloyd, but he does so right before exclaiming that the last time he hurt his son was “three goddamn years ago,” demonstrating that at this time he is personifying his “past” 1920s-30s incarnation, and his recounting doesn’t apply.

Danny attempts to deal with the traumatic event in various ways, firstly by creating the childlike story that his aggressor was a “crazy lady in one of the rooms” and secondly by succumbing completely to Tony. As the psychologist had deduced earlier, Tony had helped Danny to cope with prior violence from his father. Now, as the harm from his father escalates, so does Danny’s reliance on Tony.

The final question to be answered about the Room 237 scene is: why, if it’s Danny’s psychological invention, does it feature such adult content? The answer is that Hallorann also influences what we see, since he receives the vision. He sees Danny’s “crazy lady” fabrication through his own personal lens. Note the two conspicuous pictures of naked women on Hallorann’s bedroom walls immediately before he “shines” the scene from Danny. It makes sense that the molestation as visualized by Hallorann would feature nudity, rather than fatherly love, as the initial “attractor.”

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The 237 scene can be watched, therefore, as a blend between 1) the actual event of Jack molesting Danny, 2) Danny’s childish coping story, and 3) Hallorann’s adult perspective. Truly an original, complex piece of filmmaking that demands even more analysis than I have room for here.

Contradiction #7: Although Danny is white and male, he’s still the victim of violence, which doesn’t fit the Overlook’s history of violence targeted toward women and minorities.

In every scene after the departure of Stuart Ullman, who wears red, white, and blue, Jack and Danny don these patriotic colors. By contrast, Wendy wears greens and browns and at one point a dress with Native American motifs. The message: Ullman, Jack, and Danny have entered the role of the white men who drove away and killed Native Americans, while Wendy has assumed the unfortunate role of the Native Americans.

And Chef Hallorann, too, bears visual association with Native Americans. In the first storeroom scene, directly behind his head is a Calumet baking powder can, adorned by its “chief” logo. Hallorann dies on top of a Native American floor design, as previously mentioned. (And “Chef” and “Chief” are very lexically similar.)

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Since, as we observed in Part 1, the Overlook’s power structure excludes women and minorities, it makes sense that Kubrick visually links women and minority characters to Native Americans, the first “outsiders”—and the first hunted people—in US history.

But Danny, who wears red, white, and blue, is victimized along with Wendy and Hallorann. Why?

Because Jack is a foolish and ineffective perpetuator of the violent tradition. Danny should be allied with Jack, but Jack’s repeated violence and abuse against Danny halts this potential alliance. Remember that Jack endows Danny with the ability to “shine” by drunkenly dislocating his shoulder. Recall also that Danny later uses this ability to call Hallorann, which saves both Wendy and himself. It’s Jack’s own fault, then, that he fails to kill his family and satisfy the Overlook elites.

Delbert Grady foresees the problem, warning Jack: “Your son has a very great talent. I don’t think you are aware how great it is. And he is attempting to use that very talent against your will.” Grady worries specifically that Danny “is attempting to bring an outside party into this situation.”

Minorities are not to meddle in the affairs of the Overlook, Grady implies with this warning, and Danny, who, by virtue of his race and gender, should be a conspirator, is instead helping the outsiders. Grady suggests based on this that Danny and his supportive mother “need a good talking to….perhaps, a bit more.”

This evokes political attempts to curtail others’ rights and opportunities. For outsiders to gain entry into structures that have long excluded them, they need some help from the inside, from those already part of those structures. Someone highly invested in the status quo would indeed be alarmed upon seeing this take place. They would advocate dealing with it “in the harshest possible way.”

Danny, then, ruins everything from the Overlook’s perspective. He doesn’t follow in in his father’s footsteps; instead, he helps the intended victim—Wendy—escape her fate. Recall that in Jack’s final moments in the maze he acts like a drunkard. Fitting, because it’s his own drunken injuring of Danny that, in the end, fatally foils his attack (“Hair of the dog that bit me!”).

Contradiction #8: All of the “ghosts” that Jack converses with appear in front of mirrors. However, there’s no mirror in the scene where Jack speaks to Grady in the store room.

Many believe, incorrectly, that the mirrors demonstrate that Jack is talking to himself rather than Grady, Lloyd, and the woman in Room 237—that they’re the mere inventions of an insane man. This theory loses steam in several places. Firstly, Danny and Wendy also encounter ghosts, and these ghosts don’t have mirrors behind them. Secondly, Grady physically lets Jack out of the store room (where there isn’t even a mirror), definitively disproving all arch-theories of the “None of it was real” variety.

The ghosts are all too real. And as previously discussed, the tangible intervening of Delbert Grady demonstrates the tangible influence of old power structures.

What of the mirrors, then?

The mirrors are simply another reinforcement of the connection between past and present, which we’ve already seen in the inclusion of a Charles and Delbert Grady and with two separate Mr. Torrances. Put succinctly: When Jack talks to Lloyd and Grady, he is talking to people just like himself, hence the mirrors. (The Room 237 scene is not a literal occurrence, as we’ve seen, so the lady’s appearance in the mirror is not relevant here.) Grady, Jack, and Lloyd are all part of the Overlook’s “boys club,” so Jack can see a lot of himself in those two companions. This is the meaning of the mirrors in these two sets.

But there’s even more to the mirrors. Watch again the scene after Wendy accuses Jack of harming Danny’s neck—a correct accusation, as we’ve seen. Jack walks down the hallway in front of the Gold Room, passing mirrors on his right (our left). Each time he passes a mirror, he makes a gesture of frustration, accompanied by a jolt in the musical score. This is Jack feeling guilty: he can’t stand the sight of himself after what he has done.

The important question, though, is, can we, the viewers, stand our own reflections? This is the underlying premise of another famous scene, in which Danny uses Wendy’s lipstick to write on the bathroom door, “REDRUM.” When Wendy wakes up, she sees in the mirror what Danny has written, which now appears as “MURDER.” The takeaway: if we as a nation were to look honestly in the mirror, we would see murder: the murder of Native Americans, the spirit of which continues to inform the everyday reality of the United States. 

The Shining, then, is a damning criticism of the United States from Kubrick, but he does more than criticize: he offers a solution. Remember how Danny escapes Jack in the maze. He retraces his steps. This heroic act is what Kubrick wants us to do, figuratively.

To have knowledge of history, to act based on this knowledge, to “shine”—this is how we escape the maze and save our society from violence and corruption. By film’s end, Kubrick wants us to shine with Danny and Wendy, to have awareness of the sinister undercurrent of our nation’s history and to prepare to retrace our steps and correct the problem.

An honest appraisal of our history would be a major change. As Kubrick shows us, the tendency heretofore has been to simply “Overlook.”

 

—-Jim Andersen          

For more Kubrickian analyses, check out my piece on Eyes Wide Shut.

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Movies Explained

The Shining Explained: Part 1

This is Part 1 of my analysis of Kubrick’s The Shining. For Part 2, go here. 

Stanley Kubrick’s horror classic The Shining contains some of the most memorable images in the genre, but it continues to baffle viewers with several strange and mysterious moments. How is Jack in the ending photograph? Are the ghosts real? What, really, is “shining”? How does Jack flash through time at the Overlook? Why are there so many inconsistencies? What happens in Room 237? Who’s that guy in the bear costume?

These questions strongly suggest hidden or symbolic meanings, so it’s no surprise that many critics and fans have admirably tried to piece together Kubrick’s intentions. But I still think the existing material falls short. So in this piece, I’ll explain the mysteries of The Shining, arriving at an in depth, comprehensive interpretation of the film. My method will be to tackle one by one each specific “contradiction” or oddity in the movie, so that no mysteries are left unsolved.

So without further ado, here are The Shining‘s contradictions explained:

Contradiction #1: At the Overlook, Jack appears to be neglecting his duties; however, he laments, “All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy.” 

During Jack’s interview for the winter caretaker position, Stuart Ullman lists the job’s responsibilities as “running the boiler” and “repairing damage as it occurs.” But Jack never makes any repairs despite a major storm, and we see Wendy, not Jack, running the boiler. In addition, several scenes emphasize Jack’s laziness. For example, he wakes up past 11AM and refuses to take Wendy for a walk because he has to “work,” and when Danny wants to retrieve his fire truck, Wendy cautions him against waking Jack, even though it’s the middle of the day.

If Jack isn’t doing any of his work, why does he complain, over and over, “All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy”?

We’ll answer this, but first we need to build a foundational framework for our analysis.

Let’s start by observing that the Overlook Hotel appears to have a sort of hierarchy of ghosts. Lloyd the bartender alludes to this when he refuses Jack’s money in the Gold Room, implying that he is under orders from powerful people to treat Jack favorably: “Orders from the house.” 

One member of the Overlook’s power circle appears to be Delbert Grady. He often talks with an air of authority and conveys an interest in what goes on in the hotel as if he were in charge. But Grady isn’t acting alone: he tells Jack in the store room, “I and others have come to believe that your heart is not in this.”

Although we don’t meet these “others,” we have good reason to suspect that they, like Grady and Lloyd, are white men. Grady uses racist language when referencing Dick Hallorann, and he boasts of having “corrected” his wife and daughters after they defied him. Lloyd, for his part, encourages obvious misogyny with Jack, sympathizing as Jack refers to Wendy as “the old sperm bank upstairs.” Both of these conversations indicate that at the Overlook, women and minorities are conferred lesser status.

With this in mind, we must view the Overlook (as many other critics have done) as a microcosm of the United States.

The story of the Overlook’s founding supports this connection. Consider that, according to Stuart Ullman, the Overlook, like the United States, was built on a Native American burial ground. Builders had to repel “Indian attacks” during the Overlook’s construction.

And various lines of dialogue throughout The Shining reference westward settlers of the eighteenth century. The Torrances, for instance, converse about the Donner party. Jack makes strange, non-sequitur mentions to Lloyd of “Portland, Oregon” and “White Man’s Burden.” Native American chants are audible during the movie’s climax. Hallorann is killed on a Native American floor design.

These allusions have no bearing on the plot, nor are they present in Stephen King’s original novel, so we can only conclude that they’re important to unlocking the hidden meanings of the film. It seems clear that Kubrick wants to link the Overlook with the United States. But to what thematic purpose?

Some have concluded based on the aforementioned evidence that The Shining allegorizes the genocide of Native Americans. But this interpretation falls short. After all, Jack only kills one person (Hallorann), and he only does so because that person interferes with his attempts to kill his wife and son. If Kubrick merely wanted to allegorize a genocide, the story of Jack suddenly murdering a supporting character was a strange way to do so.

What I’ll go on to show is that Kubrick doesn’t merely retell a historical event, but uses it as a point of reference to highlight the structural problems of our present day. Specifically, The Shining is a portrayal of how the United States’ elite has perpetuated its ability to abuse power, such that the modern American family retains the discriminatory violence that characterized the nation’s founding act: a brutal genocide.

One way elites have perpetuated their power, according to Kubrick: literature. Jack is a writer by trade, and after being welcomed into the Overlook’s “old boys’ club,” his work consists only of the argument that “All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy.” In other words, the man of the house has better things to do than work, hence the need for women (Wendy) and minorities (Hallorann) to do it instead. The endless repetition of the sentence from Jack suggests that American writers use their platforms to justify the white man’s privileged lifestyle.  

Note that minor alterations in letters and format appear throughout Jack’s stack of papers. This is Kubrick’s way of saying, “the differences in literature don’t really mean anything—it’s all saying essentially the same thing.”

Contradiction #2: Ullman tells Jack that the former caretaker who killed his family was “Charles” Grady, but the man Jack meets at the Overlook identifies himself as “Delbert” Grady. Additionally, Ullman notes that the two daughters killed were “about 8 and 10” years old, but the girls Danny encounters are identical twins.

Many have written these off as insignificant script errors, in disharmony with Kubrick’s legendary attention to detail. But even ignoring Kubrick’s reputation, there’s indisputable evidence that there are in fact two separate Gradys.

In the Gold Room, Jack meets Delbert Grady, a butler at the Overlook in the 1930s (the song in the background, a 30s tune, confirms this), while Charles Grady, according to Ullman, was a new hire who killed his family in 1970. They cannot be the same person. We can assume, then, that the twins are Delbert’s daughters and that Charles’ daughters, whom we don’t see, were indeed “eight and ten.” The dresses worn by the creepy twins, after all, look dated enough for the 30s.

But it appears that the twins were murdered as well, as Danny “shines” this when he encounters them in the hallway. This may prompt confusion. Why would Kubrick indicate that there were two similar murders committed by two men with the same last name, decades apart?

Recall our thesis that The Shining demonstrates the perpetuation of violence in the United States. To Kubrick, then, this repetition of similar events reflects the nature of history. Delbert Grady, the butler, killed his family some time in the 1930s after the Gold Ball scene that Jack briefly inhabits, and Charles Grady, the caretaker, continued the tradition of violence in 1970, killing his own wife and two daughters. These Gradys, then, may be separate people, but they are essentially the same based on their deeds; in fact, they could be said to be two incarnations of the same person.

Recall the bathroom scene with Delbert Grady and Jack. It’s one of the strangest and most confusing scenes in the movie, but now we can understand what’s going on. Delbert Grady, the butler in the 1930’s who has not yet murdered his family, is jolly, subservient, and unaware of any murderous business. But when Jack questions him, he suddenly becomes sinister and composed, chillingly recounting how he murdered his family when they “didn’t care for the Overlook at first.”

It appears that he has somehow instantaneously switched in time from the 1930s “Delbert” Grady to the 1970s “Charles” Grady, who indeed brought his family to the hotel for the winter and whose family may not have “cared for the Overlook” upon being brought there. Grady has transitioned between two different incarnations of himself.

And if men can transition between different incarnations of themselves, we can infer that Charles Grady’s murder of his family in 1970 was no coincidence. It had already occurred in virtually the same manner in the 1930s, and once Charles came to the Overlook, he fell under the influence of his murderous predecessor, Delbert. (“He must have suffered a complete mental breakdown…”)

Contradiction #3: Wendy tells the psychologist that Jack hurt Danny’s arm five months ago, but Jack tells Lloyd that it was “three goddam years ago!” Also, Jack personally knows Lloyd, even though Lloyd bartended back in the 1930s.

These two versions of the arm injury story are obviously incompatible. We know that Wendy’s version is the accurate one, since she provides context for the event and links it with Danny taking a recent absence from school. Jack’s version, on the other hand, is so off that it can’t even be attributed to an honest mistake: Danny is only five years old.

We just covered the existence of two separate Gradys. Now we can see that, in addition, there are clearly two separate Mr. Torrances, both of whom injured their sons after drinking too much. Wendy and Jack are referencing two different events—just as the Charles Grady and Delbert Grady murders were two different events.

Consider that not only do Jack and Wendy’s timelines of the injury clash, but their respective descriptions of the event fail to match. Wendy says that Danny had scattered his own drawings on the floor before the incident, but Jack tells Lloyd that Danny had messed up Jack’s work papers. Again, two incompatible reports.

Remember Grady’s instantaneous shift through time in the bathroom scene—from 30s butler to 70s murderer. Applying the same concept, we can understand how Jack is able to inhabit a Gold Room party in the 1930s, meet Delbert Grady, and talk to Lloyd. Clearly, the Overlook causes Jack to incidentally shift between his present self and a previous incarnation. The two incarnations of Jack are explicitly proven in the ending scene of the movie: a man identical to Jack in an Overlook photograph taken in 1921.

So when Grady tells Jack, “You’ve always been the caretaker here,” he’s telling the truth. “Past Jack” was indeed the caretaker at the Overlook’s inception, as shown in the ending photograph.

And just like Grady, Jack sometimes transitions between incarnations. This explains how he personally knows Lloyd even before meeting him for the first time in the movie. It also explains his behavior in the Gold Room scene with Delbert Grady, during which he appears to know the dinner courses that will soon be served. It explains why Jack pines for a “glass of beer” but when Lloyd appears unexpectedly orders “bourbon on the rocks.” Finally, it explains Jack’s confusion about the amount of money in his wallet: in the first scene at the bar, he attempts to pay but realizes that he’s “temporarily light;” the next time he visits Lloyd, he has somehow acquired the money.

These discrepancies have no other conceivable explanation. In addition, they all feel oddly emphasized in the movie, as though Kubrick intended them as clues to something important.

If you need even more proof, none other than Kubrick himself, who rarely commented on his own movies, said, “The ballroom photograph at the very end suggests the reincarnation of Jack.”

We’ve definitively established that there are two Torrances, both heavy drinkers who resent their wives and harm their children. Consider Jack’s drunken behavior in the maze, howling and moaning (singing?) deliriously. How has he become intoxicated when the hotel has no alcohol on the premises? Answer: by again reverting to “past Jack,” the one shown in the ending photograph, who knew Lloyd the bartender and often drank “bourbon on the rocks.”

Contradiction #4: Hallorann implies to Danny that “shining” is a very rare gift, but by the end of the movie, most of the major characters exhibit it.

The notion that the ability to “shine” is hereditary is refuted by Wendy’s conversation with the psychologist. In this talk, the psychologist deftly exposes the truth: that, in fact, Danny’s communication with Tony began when Jack drunkenly dislocated his son’s shoulder.

What is the significance of this?

Consider each character who shines and the initial appearance of their abilities. Hallorann and his grandmother shine, but the initial appearance is unknown. Wendy shines only after Hallorann’s timely arrival in the Snowcat prevents her from being murdered by Jack. Danny, as just mentioned, began shining after Jack dislocated his arm. (Jack communicates with ghosts but does not really “shine,” as he does not perceive terrible things that happened or will happen, like Danny, Wendy, and Hallorann do.)

It’s clear from these sequences, particularly Wendy’s and Danny’s, that the ability to shine appears after being the target of violence. Danny’s shining appears after his injury. Wendy’s appears after Jack axes his way into her bedroom. Hallorann and his grandmother, it can be inferred, experienced racial hatred and hardship throughout their lives. Thus, “shining” symbolically represents the awareness that violence perpetrated primarily by white men has persisted in the United States since its founding. Only those who have experienced that violence have this awareness.

It makes sense, given this explanation, that those who shine can see into the past: experiencing violence in the present awakens them to historical horrors. Wendy for most of the movie expresses denial about Jack’s alarming tendencies (“It was just one of those things…”), but when she barely escapes her murderous husband, she finally comes to realize the brutality of powerful people in the United States—now and throughout its history.

Suddenly possessing the ability to shine, she can now see the country’s former elites (“All the best people”) in skeleton form, a stuffy-looking man who seems to be enjoying the violence (“Great party, isn’t it?”), and the famous elevator of blood: the representation of bloodshed through the history of the United States. Danny and Hallorann, having already experienced violence at the hands of white men, could already see these images.

Contradiction #5: Tony tells Danny to “remember what Mr. Hallorann said: it’s just like pictures in a book, Danny, it isn’t real.” But in Hallorann’s conversation with Danny, he never says this. Also, Jack tells Grady, “I saw your picture in the newspaper,” although Ullman told him about the Grady murders in person.

These two contradictions seem unrelated but are in fact referring to the same thing. Jack’s comment to Grady can be explained by noting the repeated appearances of a book of newspaper clippings on Jack’s desk with his typewriter. Apparently, Jack has been doing research on the Grady murders. theshining5

It seems silly that Jack would need to do extensive research to write one sentence over and over again. Recall, however, that “All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy” represents the promotion of a classist structure that places white males in a position of relative privilege. The Grady murders actually would be important research for such an undertaking, since the case concerns a white father killing his family after they defied him.

More difficult to understand is Tony’s attempt to comfort Danny after seeing the twins. But again, the comment refers to the same thing. The “pictures in a book” are the newspaper pictures in Jack’s book of clippings. Thus, Tony is telling Danny, essentially, that the images of the dead twins are not “real” because they are from the past—“pictures in a book” of old newspapers. This actually does correspond with “what Mr. Hallorann said,” since Hallorann compared the disturbing images haunting Danny to “if someone burns toast,” dismissing the images as only a “trace” of what happened in the hotel’s past.

Tony and Hallorann therefore reassure Danny by dismissing the influence of the past on the present. This reassurance, however, is proven to be misguided by subsequent events. When Jack is trapped in the store room, he is physically released by Delbert Grady, not something that a mere “trace” or “picture in a book” would be capable of. The store room scene therefore emphasizes that the past can be very “real” indeed—contrary to the advice of Tony and Hallorann.

This message is important and relevant to modern society: don’t those at the top have reliable means of maintaining their power? Aren’t they bailed out by their old family friendships and connections and even by other unseen, unknown elites who wish to preserve the status quo? The store room scene, which many have cited as a disappointing example of deus ex machina, is actually a reminder of this tangible power of the past to perpetuate itself—a power that Tony doesn’t recognize, and that Hallorann tries to downplay.

 

End of Part 1

Continue to Part 2, where I conclude the analysis by solving the mystery of Room 237 and examining Kubrick’s careful use of mirrors.